Liza Mundy

While writ­ing the best-sell­ing Code Girls, about women work­ing in a World War II de­cryp­tion ser­vice, Mundy dis­cov­ered the Venona Project, the con­fi­den­tial, fe­male-driven ef­fort to crack en­coded Soviet mes­sages in the Cold War (p. 30). For Smith­so­nian, the for­mer Wash­ing­ton Post re­porter snagged an exclusive in­ter­view with the last re­main­ing fe­male cryp­tog­ra­pher, An­ge­line Nanni. “If you saw her on the street, you would have no idea of the fas­ci­nat­ing life she led or her in­cred­i­ble con­tri­bu­tion to his­tory.”